Three Gifts

What would you do with the three gifts of the nativity?

Without delving into the labyrinthine theological complexities of the Nativity, what would one do if they received a delivery of gold, frankincense and myrrh?

Gold

You would probably want to get it assayed and valued.

Gold purity is measured as the karat which is a measure of the purity of the substance. Precious metals are often alloyed with other metals to give them different properties such as increasing the durability of the metal.

For example Sterling Silver consists of 92.5% silver and 7.5%, by mass, of other metals, usually copper.

The measure of the karat is used for gold, and is an indication of percentage of gold. It is out of 24, with the highest being 24/24, or 24 karat gold.

If you are lucky, the gold will be in a convenient format, like bullion coin or gold bar.

These are known formats, issued by countries with known weights and purity values.

For example in order to be called a gold bullion, the coin must be stamped and of regulated weight and at one point must have been legal tender. For example a gold United Kingdom Sovereign weights exactly 7.3224g.

Gold bars, known as Good Delivery bars are less regulated due to their shape. Without certificates of authenticity would likely need to be assayed to work out its exact composition and certificates issued.

Regardless, in one of these formats you could then genuinely walk into a suitable bank and sell said gold. It is currently worth about $33,000/kg.

However if it is not in one of the aforementioned formats, then you would need to go a lot further to refine or convince someone of its worth.

Frankincense

Frankincense also known as olibanum is an incense which has particular significance in Jewish tradition, used at the time as an offering, incense and in perfume.

The word 'frankincense' comes from the Frankish Crusaders which introduced it to Europe. However it was known to ancient civilisations like the Greeks and Chinese, being primarily an export from South Arabia.

The actual material is a dried aromatic resin which comes from the Boswellia tree. The resin is collected much the same way as rubber by carving grooves in the trunk and collecting the resin.

The flowers of the Boswellia tree

If you received some now you might use it as an incense (common in Eastern Orthodox Christian churches). It has uses in the perfume industry as well as medical research where it is being investigated for potential use in cancer research.

Myrrh

If you received myrrh, you would want to make sure you weren't getting muddled up with frankincense as they both look very similar, and are used in very similar ways. Traditionally used as a perfume, incense and medicine. Particularly as a medicine myrrh would have been useful for its antiseptic properties. In modern research it is again of interest for its potential anti-cancer effects.

The resin is harvested from another arabian tree, the Commiphora myrrha tree.

Conclusion

In conclusion, if someone gave you the three gifts of the Nativity, you might wonder what was going on. One of them requires extensive paperwork and the other two literally grow on trees.

Eddie Izzard describing the Christmas Nativity - contains swearing Video

Sleep in Ants

Today’s trivia is about Ants, and in particular their sleep patterns.

Firstly we can confirm that Ants do sleep and exhibit demonstrable sleep behaviours.

We will dig further into the subterranean life of these invertebrates to understand more about their sleep patterns.

There is only a handful of research papers on sleep in Ants. (Bees are considerably more researched). The paper we are most interested in is this one:

Polyphasic Wake-Sleep Episodes in the Fire Ant Solenopsis Invicta

The research paper covers a particular species, Solenopsis Invicta famous for its stinging ability.

Sleep in Insects

Sleep in insects is particularly interesting because insects have quite different physiology. Another problem is how to actually determine sleep in insects:

Homeostasis: The balance between sleep and awake periods, sleep deprived flies are more sleepy during the day

Alertness: Insects which are sleeping are slow to respond to external stimulus

Circadian Rhythm: Insects that live above ground are likely to have periods of increased activity and periods of rest in line with a daily cycle, insects which live underground are generally polyphasic with no discernable circadian rhythm

Getting an Ant colony

How does one acquire an ant colony to study sleep patterns? Ant hives are constructed entirely underground with only thermal venting sections placed above ground.

Drip flotation method

In fire ants, the drip floatation method takes advantage of a flood-survival adaptation of the ants to accomplish this task. The key principle is that ants are so small and light that they are naturally buoyant. They also have a waxy coating which helps repel water and allows the entire colony to stay afloat when they cling together. Combined with their ability to self organise they can effectively float an entire colony on water.

• Dig up an ant colony and place it in a large bucket
• After 24 hours the ants will reestablish the structure of the colony with brood in chambers and tunnels to the surface excavated
• Talc powder is used on the sides of the container to prevent the ants climbing the sides.
• Water is dripped slowly into the bucket
• After 4-8 hours the water level rises slowly enough the the colony has gathered on the surface, brood and queens included
• Eventually the colony will form a raft, floating on the surface which can then be transferred to an artificial nest.

Sleep Patterns

Key observation about the sleep behavior as anticipated is that because they are a subterranean species they are not affected by day/night cycles, rather sleep patterns are determined by activity in the hive.

Workers

• Average 253 sleeps per day
• Each sleep about 1 minute
• Total 4.8 hours of sleeping a day

Workers tend to sleep in one of three locations, the chamber floor, ceiling or side of chamber. Those that sleep on the chamber floor were most likely to be woken by other workers passing by. Seemingly the best place to sleep was the side of the chamber.

Queens

• Average of 92 sleeps per day
• Each sleep about 6 minutes
• Total 9.6 hours of sleeping per day

Queens exhibited two observable sleep patterns:

Dozing: antenna extended, stationary, likely to be woken by contact from a worker.

Deep sleep: antenna tucked in close, stationary, unresponsive to external stimulus. Prone to random antenna movement during deep sleep.

Delightfully the queens would synchronise their sleep patterns so that they all would sleep at the same time, and woke up at the same time. They did this by huddling together when they slept, like hounds. When one started to stir the others would wake up as well.

Conclusion

The net result of this experiment found that at any given time there was on average 80% of the work force available to work on grooming, feeding or excavating sand. Queens in this species can live for 6 years, workers only one month.

The hive is always busy (hyper active) at attending to the needs of the Queens and buffering them from environmental effects which might be detrimental. This allows the queens to maintain a high reproductive efficiency and extend their longevity.

References

More about Fire Ants

Video of a sleeping Bee